Fires of Prophecy_ Book Two of the Morcyth Saga - Brian Pratt [142]
When Essin calls for the first break, Miko is dazed and exhausted even though his day isn’t even half over. When the slave comes over to give him his bread and water, he at first doesn’t realize it, but then his eyes focus on who the slave is. Black Tooth!
When he reaches for his bread, Black Tooth gives him a dark look and drops it to the ground before he can take hold of it. When he gives him the ladle, he finds that it’s only half full of water.
Black Tooth gives him an evil grin as he takes the ladle back. Nate, standing beside him doesn’t fail to notice what is going on. After Black Tooth is gone and the break is over, they return to mining the ore.
“You know him?” he asks, referring to Black Tooth.
“Yeah,” Miko replies as he carries the rocks over to the wagon. “He lost his hand because he tried to attack me one night and the guards cut it off, probably because he had a knife.”
“That’s the general rule,” he says. “I take it he doesn’t care for you too much, then?”
“You could say that,” agrees Miko.
“You’ll never survive if he only gives you half rations,” Nate tells him.
“What should I do?” Miko asks.
“If he does it again,” he explains, “tell Essin. I’ll back you up on it.”
“Alright,” he says, “I’ll do that.”
The rest of the day passes pretty much as the previous one had. Apparently their quota was four wagon loads a day. “And there better not be just rock in there either!” Essin keeps telling them. At the second to last break of the day, Black Tooth is again the one to bring their bread and water. Miko figures he’s given that job because a one handed man is of little use otherwise.
When he comes to Miko, he gives him another of his crooked grins as he fills the ladle again only half full. Instead of taking it, Miko hollers over to where Essin stands, “He’s only giving me a half ration of water!”
Black Tooth’s smile disappears as he quickly dips the ladle back in before Essin has time to come over to see what he’s doing.
“What’s going on over here?” he asks, obviously not pleased at having been disturbed.
Indicating Black Tooth, Miko says, “This man here is only giving me half rations of water.”
Essin speaks to Black Tooth and gets a reply. “He says you just want seconds,” he says to Miko.
Nate steps in and says, “I’ve seen it. He’s been shorting Miko because of an old grudge.”
Essin looks from Nate, Miko and then to Black Tooth. Making up his mind he says something to Black Tooth and then walks away.
Black Tooth gives Miko a dark look, dips the ladle and gives him a full measure. Miko takes it and says, “Thank you” to him very pleasantly just to irritate him.
“What did Essin say to him?” Miko asks Nate once they’ve returned to work.
“He said if he ever shorts one of his workers again, he’ll have the other hand cut off,” he replies.
“Good,” Miko says with malice. He really doesn’t care too much for Black Tooth.
Near the end of their shift, there’s a rumble from off in the mines and then someone comes running and says something excitedly to Essin.
“Leave your picks boys,” he tells them. “There’s been a cave-in and we’ve been told to go help dig ‘em out.”
He turns and leads them at a quick pace down a side tunnel that has dust belching out of it. They go down it a ways and arrive at a spot where the ceiling has fallen in and has either trapped or killed the men that had been working this area.
They begin to clear the rubble as fast as they can, sometimes several of them have to work together to move a sizeable boulder. Miko works diligently and suddenly sees an arm sticking out of the rubble after removing a stone. “Someone’s under here!” he hollers.
Everyone begins to clear that section until the body can be removed. Miko gets sick when he sees the skull has been smashed and the man’s brains are oozing through the cracks.
They find three more bodies before they break through to the other side where the rest of the crew had been trapped. One has a broken arm and another a broken leg, the rest of the